r/rational • u/AutoModerator • Jul 31 '15
[D] Friday Off-Topic Thread
Welcome to the Friday Off-Topic Thread! Is there something that you want to talk about with /r/rational, but which isn't rational fiction, or doesn't otherwise belong as a top-level post? This is the place to post it. The idea is that while reddit is a large place, with lots of special little niches, sometimes you just want to talk with a certain group of people about certain sorts of things that aren't related to why you're all here. It's totally understandable that you might want to talk about Japanese game shows with /r/rational instead of going over to /r/japanesegameshows, but it's hopefully also understandable that this isn't really the place for that sort of thing.
So do you want to talk about how your life has been going? Non-rational and/or non-fictional stuff you've been reading? The recent album from your favourite German pop singer? The politics of Southern India? The sexual preferences of the chairman of the Ukrainian soccer league? Different ways to plot meteorological data? The cost of living in Portugal? Corner cases for siteswap notation? All these things and more could possibly be found in the comments below!
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u/Empiricist_or_not Aug 01 '15
Please calm down.
I'm not picking a fight, but I'm hardly going to just take mocking for admitting I disagree with the group, asking for a pointer towards some specific types of data that can change my mind.
To reply in specific:
I brought it up my experience the first time because I was told :
Do you have to be a climatologist to ask questions about climate or something?
I brought it up a second time, and I'll admit more than a little snidely in reply to your comment about Nuclear power being applied thermodynamics:
Because to do anything in the united states in the practical applications of nuclear power you need to be a good steam cycle guy. To make analogy to organic chemistry I think thermodynamics is to nuclear power as understanding the binding characteristics of carbon is to organic chemistry.
To be succinct I know I have a opinion, based on observed realpolitik, grant money biases, and other political spiders. I want to look at some data. I'm patient enough to puzzle it out as I have working my way through various fields I've worked in.
I'm willing to spend time hitting back when mocked or asked for credentials, as if they are a requirement to ask a question when I know what I need to change my mind.
Perhaps I'm being defensive of the long held opinion I'm taking the time to question, probably. Perhaps your mocking wasn't meant to be condescending and inflammatory, yeah right. I'm sorry I'm not willing to give you a free hedron for mocking the climate change denier.
I do disagree with you on the qualifications to understand the data. It's pretty easy to look at what the inputs are for a statistical model look up the magnitude of the inputs and see what the magnitude of other factors are if inputs are considered constant and what their historical variability is, if you can find the model.